


Pandora's Box

by Pale Rider (Boothros)



Category: The Professionals
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-27
Updated: 2015-03-27
Packaged: 2018-03-19 19:59:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3622362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Boothros/pseuds/Pale%20Rider
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You probably won't like this much. I didn't really like writing it much. But it was determined to get itself out there, so here it is. Make of it what you will but if you do comment, please don't hurt me too much xx<br/>*WARNING posted at the end, if you must, but it IS a spoiler</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pandora's Box

                                              Pandora’s Box

“Well that was ninety minutes of our lives that we’ll never be getting back.”

“It’s only a game, Doyle and a pre-season friendly at that! It doesn’t really matter in the great scheme of things does it?”

“Hah! All week I’ve had ‘Liverpool for the cup!’ rammed down my throat, and now ‘It’s only a game, Doyle!'”

“God you can be an irritating little sod at times, can’t you!”

“Yes, I know, Bodie, I practise daily. Now it’s your turn to get the beers by my reckoning.”

“For heaven’s sake, we’re meant to be in at seven! How come is it when it’s your beer you’re drinking, you’re ‘Mr Responsible’ and when it’s mine, (of which there’s very little left by the way), it's ‘your time to get the beers, Bodie.’”

“Oh come on, mate, just one more won’t hurt, and I’d never get to sleep if I went to bed now, far too early!”

“Oh, Christ, you’re commandeering the sofa again then are you?” Bodie rolled his eyes heavenwards.

“Well probably wouldn’t be the greatest idea to drive home after all the beer you’ve been tipping down my throat, and I hate to deprive you of my scintillatin’ company.”

Resigned, Bodie took himself out to his small kitchen and relieved his fridge of the last two cans.

“Right, this is the last one you’re getting! After that you’ll get some kip if I have to punch your lights out for you. Some of us need our beauty sleep.”

Doyle’s sudden explosion of laughter made his beer froth all over Bodies carpet.

“Sorry, mate but you said that, not me!”

“You’re pissed, Doyle. It’s not an attractive quality in a young man, you know.”

“What we got to watch now then?” said Doyle, changing the subject.

“Nothing. We’re on early turn remember? Though if you feel the need for enlightenment, ‘The News’ is about to start.”

“Bo’daaay! We get enough bloody ‘news’ all day at work! Where’s that tape you got?”

“What tape?”

“That video tape that Macklin’s mate got for you? I know you brought it home it ‘cos I saw you smuggle it in under yer coat in a carrier bag. And where’s yer Scotch?”

“Right that’s it! I’m making you a coffee, then chucking a pillow at you. The TV goes off and I manage to get some well-earned sleep. If you think I’m sitting up all night watching you working on your hangover, you’ve got another thing coming.”

“Aww come on, Bodie, where’s yer sense of adventure?”

“I left it somewhere on the North Circular at about four o’clock this afternoon. Now coffee, and kip!” replied Bodie, getting irritated.

Bodie escaped to the kitchen and started spooning instant granules into mugs. He returned to the living room to find his partner with his feet up on the settee. On the screen, flickering green images were announcing the start of Bodie’s latest porn.

“Oi! What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing? I thought I said it was time for sleep? And where did you get that you thieving little bastard?” he asked indicating the tape that Doyle had located and loaded into Bodie’s machine with near Olympian speed.

“Shhh, I’m watchin!”

Wondering what earthly listening pleasure Doyle could glean from the typical tinny soundtrack of a low grade skin flick, Bodie resigned himself to a further twenty minutes of his partner’s nonsensical ramblings.

Blowing on his drink, Bodie nearly burned himself when Doyle exclaimed loudly,

“Bodie!”

“Yes, Raymond?”

“This film!”

“What about it, for Christ’s sake?”

“Well, did you know that there was gonna be anything a bit, well ‘odd’ about it?”

“‘Odd’ in what way, Doyle?”

“Well, take a look at it! It’s all blokes, Bodie! There’s not a single well stacked bird amongst ‘em!”

“Well, so sorry to disappoint you M’ Lord! I’ll try a bit harder next time to get something that meets your exacting standards!”

“So what are you doin’ with a film full of blokes in it, Bodie?”

“Well you know Macklin’s mate, you pays your money and you takes your chance. And if you will insist on taking advantage of my generosity, then you, my friend, will just have get what you’re given!”

But Doyle was no longer listening to Bodie, his eyes were glued to the images being portrayed on the screen. Bodie tried once again to engage Doyle’s attention, in the vain hope he would take the hint and let them both get some rest. Resigned to his partner’s uncanny knack of taking the piss however, he was unsurprised to get little more response than a grunt.

“Bodie?”

“Yes, Ray?” Bodie sighed.

“Did you… did you ever do anything like that? With another bloke I mean?”

For the rest of his life, Bodie would wonder why he responded as he did, but he wasn’t prepared to lie.

“Might have done, once or twice.”

“What! But… but, you never told me! Why did you never tell me that, Bodie?”

“Didn’t really figure it was any of your bloody business to be perfectly honest.”

“Of course it is! I’m your partner for God’s sake!”

“I don’t see that that makes any earthly difference. Some things are private, Doyle, even from nosey little sods like you!”

“But… if you’d told me, I mean if I’d known…”

“Yes, if you’d known, then what? What difference does it make to you? Doesn’t make me any less of a partner does it?”

“No of COURSE not, that’s not what I meant at all!”

“Then what DID you mean, Ray for God’s sake?” replied Bodie tiring of the conversation.

“Well I meant, if… if I’d known, then perhaps we could have…”

“Could have what?”

“Well you know, we could have, um, done something together. Perhaps.”

“What are you on about?”

“Oh strewth, Bodie what I’m saying, you great berk, is that if only I’d known that you, you know, swung the other way as well, then praps we could have… gotten it together!”

“Oh don’t be so fucking ridiculous, Doyle!”

“Eh?”

“Well do you actually think, that just because on a few occasions I happen to have slept with men that I would seriously consider getting it on with you?”

“Why, what’s wrong with me?” replied Doyle dismayed.

“Nothing’s wrong with you, you stupid sod, but if you’ve got any designs on me, you best forget ‘em, ‘cos it’s never gonna happen!”

“Why not?”

“It just isn’t, Doyle. Now I suggest you get some sleep and forget this stupid conversation ever happened, ‘cos I for one, am getting slightly tired of it and even more tired of you. If you don’t fancy getting slung out on your ear after all, I suggest you shut the hell up and get those lights turned off. I’m off to bed, and if you’ve got a stinking headache in the morning, don’t come crying to me.”

The dismissal was final and Doyle knew that pushing Bodie further would be unwise. He was also slightly too drunk to act on his new found knowledge, though as he settled down on his makeshift bed, he had a smile on his face. If Bodie thought for a second that Doyle was going to ignore this God given opportunity, then Bodie could think again.

*********************

Attempting to get Bodie to come around to his way of thinking was much harder than Doyle had anticipated. In fact, he mused to himself, it was damn near impossible. Bodie who had always been overly touchy feely where Doyle was concerned suddenly appeared to adopt a strictly hands off approach, leaving Doyle wanting. He attempted to woo Bodie as many times as he dared. He tried out subtle little touches of his own, lingering suggestive looks and not so subtle hints, but all to no avail. If anything, Doyle’s actions were frankly irritating Bodie more than anything else.

The more Bodie spurned Doyle’s advances, the more Doyle wanted him. He had always had a glad eye for his handsome partner but until the revelation of the video tape had never dared dream that his longings would ever come to anything. He had no doubt in his mind that bedding Bodie could only be classed as a good thing. A bloody good thing if he had anything to do with it. They were after all partners in every other respect. They were friends, and were both young and fit with enough testosterone flowing through their veins to sink a ship. Doyle couldn’t see a problem. He just needed to convince Bodie of the fact.

Bodie was becoming exasperated by Doyle’s antics. Doyle was pushing him somewhere that he didn’t want to go and no matter what he said to try and dissuade Doyle from his latest bright idea, Doyle just wasn’t getting it. He didn’t want to hurt his friend’s feelings, but sooner or later he was going to have to take Doyle to one side and tell him exactly what was what. To end this stupid infatuation, or whatever it was, permanently.

Doyle didn’t immediately notice the changes in Bodie. They had had their spats before of course, but it was unlike Bodie to be moody for too long, that was far more Doyle’s style. Gradually however, Doyle noticed that Bodie was showing his sunny disposition less and less. He was often grumpy and irritable and showed Doyle far less patience than he ever had before. Their evenings out together seemed to tail off. Bodie rarely even mentioned going out for a pint and rebuffed Doyle whenever he himself suggested it. Bodie always seemed to have a date, though Doyle was rarely allowed to meet the women that Bodie waxed lyrical about to all who would listen.

Doyle’s love life had all but dried up completely. He’d been so caught up in his quest to snare Bodie that he had virtually forgotten the existence of women and didn’t miss their presence for a moment. He did however feel extraordinarily lonely at the end of each working day. It seemed that the only time he got to see his partner at all was whilst on duty. For the first time in living memory, he started to resent any free time that was due to him and longed to be at work. He tried to tone down his behaviour towards Bodie. He also made a conscientious effort to appear cheerful and carefree, as though if he tried hard enough, it might actually be true. Bodie was disconcerted by this ‘happy’ version of Doyle and treated him with nothing less than scorn. Any previous pleasure they had felt in each other’s company seemed to be gradually evaporating. The kind and funny Bodie was slowly being replaced by a surly, sarcastic and often very dislikeable version of himself.

Troubled, Doyle realised that his own actions must be to blame. His idiotic fantasy was in danger of blowing the best friendship he had ever had. The torch he carried refused however to be dimmed. Bewildered and hurt, he valiantly strove for harmony for the sake of the partnership which itself, looked to be on precariously shaky ground.

********************

It was on a wet Monday afternoon that the partners were summoned to their controller’s office. For months, Cowley had been convinced that the supply and demand for hard drugs was causing a growing element of gang warfare in London. Cowley was perfectly happy to let the drug lords kill each other to help eradicate the problem. The Government however, in the lead up to an election, had promised its public a clampdown on this scourge on society. Drugs would be removed from the streets and their peddlers would be dealt with severely.

An agent had traced one such peddler to a nightclub in South London. Cowley needed an inside ear on the place and knew just the man for the job.

“Ah, 4~5. I do believe that this particular establishment is one that you’re familiar with?”

Doyle looked at the card that Cowley handed him and chuckled when he recognized the name.

“Ah yes, Sir I have felt the odd collar in ‘Honey Trapz’ in my time. Is this where you recon the deals are going down then?”

“Well young Stuart has followed several wanted names to the place but he doesn’t have any contacts within it. As you do, Doyle, I thought you’d rather fancy a trip there with Master Bodie here.”

“I suppose we could slum it for the afternoon, Sir." said Doyle with a grin. "Might be a bit useful for Bodie’s education as well!”

“Indeed, Doyle.” Replied Cowley with the smallest hint of a smile. Just mind you don’t let him get too friendly with the ‘hostesses’. Right, on your bikes the pair of you!”

“Where exactly is he sending us?” enquired Bodie once they were in the car.

“Ah, the promised land, my son. We’re off to see Sadie!”

“Oh for God’s sake, please tell me you’re joking?” Bodie groaned.

Bodie’s fervent dislike for the aging transvestite was well known to Doyle who privately thought Bodies attitude a little unnecessary. Sadie had always proved a reliable informant who Doyle quietly admired. She hadn’t had an easy life but had somehow survived the hard knocks since the time that Doyle had first known her from his days on the beat.

The partners strolled through the unlocked doors of Honey Trapz. The club was dark and quiet at this time of day. Two remarkably good looking young men looked up at the unexpected arrivals. One was emptying bags of coins into a till and the other was desultorily pushing a broom around. Judging by the way his feet seemed to stick to the floor, Bodie didn’t imagine that the youth’s skills extended to the use of a mop and bucket.

Doyle smiled sweetly at each of the men.

“Hi, we’re here to see Sadie. She about?”

“Depends who wants her.” Said the sweeper trying to emulate the bouncers who would later adorn the doorway.

“Tell her Ray Doyle’s here to see her.”

“No need, no need!” called a sing song voice.

Bodie closed his eyes in resignation and sighed as Sadie swept in, dressed in flamboyant evening wear and full make up.

“Raymond, dahling! And you brought your little friend!” crowed Sadie appreciatively.

Bodie never had been able to quite place the faked accent. It was part colonial British and part fresh faced Californian. Either way it sounded stupid coming from the mouth of a fifty six year old man from Croydon and was just another thing about ‘Sadie’ that made Bodie bristle.

Doyle however, seemed inordinately pleased to see Sadie and kissed her fully on the lips in greeting. Bodie cringed in astounded disbelief. He could not understand Doyle’s tolerance for Sadie never mind his actual apparent liking for the creature. And what right did ‘Sadie’ have to go round virtually snogging people’s partners? Irritated, Bodie was content to let Doyle conduct the interview by himself and looked around for inspiration. Some of the other queens were emerging from the shadows. They were either here for their rehearsals or more likely to partake in a quick livener at the bar. Bodie didn’t care which, and fully prepared to frighten the panties off of them, he went in search of interviews of his own. In passing, he noted that Sadie was clutching Doyle’s hand tightly. They looked like a pair of star crossed lovers and Bodie was revolted.

An hour later, Doyle called Bodie away from his fruitless interrogations.

“We’re just about done here, mate. Just off for a slash and we can get goin’.”

Bodie’s relief turned to distaste as he realized he had been left with the odious Sadie. The drag queen seemed to show no shame whatsoever at the tear stains that were making a hideous mess of the artfully applied make up.

“Well, Mr Mean and Moody, alone at last!” exclaimed Sadie, trying but not quite managing to purr.

Bodie said nothing in reply but arched an arrogant eyebrow.

“You really don’t realize what you’ve got there do you, Sugar?” Sadie said quietly.

“What? What the hell are you on about?”

“Doyle is what I’m on about. That boy’s in love with you, make no mistake.”

“Oh yeah, tell you that did he?”

“He didn’t need to, Sugar, I just had to see him looking at you. Don’t you see it, don’t you feel it?”

“What I see and feel is absolutely none of your fucking business.”

“Ah, in denial are we? God, I wouldn’t be if I had him wanting me.”

“Well sadly for you, he doesn’t does he? I mean hardly surprising really is it, washed up crock of shit like you, can’t imagine that anyone would.”

“Ooh sticks and stones, Mr Bodie, but you won’t hurt me. You get to a certain time in life when words can’t hurt you anymore because you’ve heard them all once too often. You got a chance, Sugar, Ray Doyle could make you happy. They don’t make ‘em with more heart than him.”

“Listen you old faggot. Doyle’s my partner, nothing more. Just because you want to get your filthy hands on him, doesn’t mean we all do!”

“Me thinks the gentleman doth protest too much! Just look after him, Mr Bodie. He’s special that one, just you make sure you look after him. Please.”

Whilst mentally scrambling for the next cutting reply that Sadie somehow always seemed to be able to provoke from him, Bodie noted Doyle’s return. Already exiting the club, he didn’t notice Doyle embrace Sadie in farewell.

Bodie was thoughtful on the way back to the car. Where the fuck had all that come from? He had treated Sadie appallingly. He knew that he could be hard and mean when needed, but that situation had hardly warranted it. Ashamed of himself, he was hardly listening when Doyle started to speak on the way back.

“The manager fucked off last month, warned off by a drug baron. Sadie’s virtually running the place on her own to keep them all in a job. She’s terrified. All the girls are. All their old dealers have all been kicked out and the heavy mob have moved in. They’re demanding protection money and all sorts.”

“They’re not ‘girls,’ Doyle, they’re ugly old blokes in dresses. And as for the fantastic ‘Sadie’, well he was letching after you for all he was worth!”

Doyle pulled up outside Bodies flat and then just sat there for a moment, stunned.

“I… I just can’t believe you just said that!”

“Well it’s true isn’t it?”

“Oh yeah, it’s true, Bodie. Maybe you should write it all down in your report tomorrow. And when Cowley tells you that you’re talking like an absolute cunt all of a sudden, it’ll save me doing it!”

Bodie hardly had the chance to exit the car before Doyle reversed with a screech of tyres and roared off without looking back.

********************

Doyle had only managed a single hour’s troubled sleep when the red phone rang.

“4~5? Alpha One. There’s been an incident at the Honey Trapz Club. The Police are in attendance, but Bodie thought that you would want to be there. We can send a car for you if needs be?”

Doyle groggily looked at his watch. It was just past midnight.

“No, Sir, I’ll be there in about forty minutes.”

Despite his troubled mind, Doyle’s heart had still given a little lurch when Cowley had mentioned Bodie’s name and he hated himself for it. He quickly threw some water over his face, redressed in the scattered clothing he had worn the previous day and was in the car and on the road within ten minutes. The streets were reasonably clear and he made it to the club within half an hour. He expected the scene outside with the blue lights and the yellow tape. It was the scene inside that he was dreading. Bodie was stood waiting for him by the entrance. Doyle said nothing but nodded once and Bodie ushered him inside.

Though Doyle has seen perhaps too much within his years of law enforcement, few things could have prepared him for the sight of ‘Sadie’ Gillespie’s murder scene. He stood looking at the sight before him in a detached manner. He was somewhat amazed that a blood spatter could reach so high up a tiled wall. That one small person could have been holding in all that blood. That a human heart weighing less than a pound could control and direct that huge volume of heavy, viscous fluid.

Whoever had knifed Sadie to death had done it with two purposes in mind. To silence her once and for all and to warn anyone else of ever speaking out. There were few places on Sadie’s body that hadn’t been slashed but it was the stains around the crotch area of the dress that would remain in Doyle’s mind. This was no homophobic attack however. Instinctively, Doyle knew that Sadie had died because she had confided in him.

He looked at the once beautiful face. Never again would he see the exquisitely made up eyes or hear the sing song voice. Instead, he would always see a sad little man from Croydon. A gentle man who had been beaten up, spat on and sworn at for most of his adult life. Doyle turned away, there was nothing for him here now.

The rest of the clubs staff were in meltdown. Doyle spent the next hour trying to console and comfort. No useful information was forthcoming, not that he expected any. The young man that had discovered Sadie’s body in the ladies toilet turned out to be the sweeper from the day before. He was so traumatised that Doyle eventually saw to it that he was taken off in an ambulance.

Finally admitting that there was nothing more that he could usefully do and feeling that his presence was somehow unwelcome now, Doyle turned to go.

As he reached his haphazardly parked car, he felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to face his partner.

“Ray? I’m… I’m sorry, mate. I know he… sorry, she was a friend of yours.”

Doyle gave Bodie a dull eyed look, shrugged his shoulders and turned back to the car.

Back in bed, Doyle stared at the ceiling knowing that further sleep was unlikely. He felt like crying but the tears wouldn’t come. Who he would be crying for however, Sadie, Bodie or himself, he didn’t really know.

********************

The partnership that Bodie and Doyle had once enjoyed continued to disintegrate. Each felt guilty at the way they had affected the other and neither could admit to working at full efficiency. Somewhere along the line the synchronicity that they had always relied on failed them.

Things came to a head during a house raid. Harry Rubins was the man Cowley wanted in his cache. Painstaking legwork and sensitive interviewing had provided convincing enough evidence to persuade the controller that Rubins was the main man behind the protection rackets. Rubins owned an impressive portfolio of suburban property. A tip off had suggested that one of these properties provided accommodation for four of Rubins’ henchmen. There was every likelihood that the planned raid would net drugs and weapons. Doyle was not immune to the fact if anyone chose to be at home, they could also possibly net Sadie Gillespie’s murderer.

There was a nervous undercurrent to the job. Others had noticed that things were strained between Bodie and Doyle and the bad atmosphere seemed to rub off on everyone. Even the best planned operations have the capacity to go wrong and this one was no exception.

Bodie and Doyle had staked out the house for a week before the raid. They had established that there were four inhabitants who left together at the same time every day. The team would enter the house after it had been vacated, collect any evidence to be had and then casually await the occupants return.

Bodie and Doyle entered the house with textbook efficiency closely shadowed by Anson and Jax, who started to sweep the ground floor. Doyle covered Bodie as he silently climbed the stairs and they split up to quickly survey the two rooms.

Doyle was suddenly alerted to a cry from the floor below. He bolted to the staircase and was halfway down the flight when a gunshot thundered overhead.

“Bodie!” he screamed before turning tail and racing back up the stairs. He burst into the first of the bedrooms to see his partner standing over a prone body. White faced with relief, he urged Bodie back downstairs where a standoff was taking place. A youth no older than sixteen held a knife to Jax’s throat and Anson had a gun trained on him.

“Drop it!” commanded Doyle.

The boy twisted round towards Doyle’s voice and Anson put a slug into his shoulder.

The accusations were not long in coming. Anson was livid.

“I thought you two cowboys said that there were only four of them! We saw ‘four of them’ go out this morning, so were did these two little surprises come from then, eh?”

Bodie, equally angry, retaliated.

“We only saw four in the whole week we were watching them! I dunno, perhaps they kept them in the cellar or something, they’re only kids for Christ’s sake!”

“Well the one upstairs isn’t, least he isn’t anymore, poor bastard.” Doyle offered.

Bodie turned the full force of his anger towards Doyle.

“If he was old enough to come at me waving a gun around, he was old enough to get shot by one. And what the fuck did you think you were doing? He came from the room that you had just supposedly bloody well searched! And on top of that, you burst into a room that you’d just heard a gunshot from! Good job the shot came from my gun, wasn’t it else you might well be pasted all over the walls by now, you fucking stupid prick!”

“And…” sneered Anson, “It’s no thanks to you, Doyle, that we’re not mopping up Jax’s blood right now is it?”

“But… I heard the gunshot, Bodie was up there…”

Bodie shoved Doyle to one side and started to speak, his voice low and menacing.

“I’ve told you before, Doyle to think with your brains and not your balls. If you ever, EVER do something that fucking stupid again, I’ll fucking shoot you myself!”

Doyle looked Bodie in the eye, daring him to say more and give him the excuse to lash out. Instead he swallowed his anger and replied neutrally.

“I guess we ought to check the bedrooms again.”

The swinging hatch door to the attic exposed the previous hiding place of the youth that Bodie had shot. They also found the evidence that Cowley had sent them to look for. Locating the wrapped heroin there gave the team no satisfaction. The discovery of the arms in the cellar from where the other youth had sprung was no more heartening. CI5 had lost its element of surprise. A shootout in a leafy street and the removal of two teenage boys by ambulance and hearse was better than a flashing neon sign to Rubins.

Cowley was furious and no one could really blame him for being so. On Monday morning Ray Doyle stood in his office, looking anywhere but at his boss.

“I want to be re-partnered, Sir.”

“Oh you do, Doyle, do you?”

“It’s for the best, Sir.”

“And you came to that conclusion how exactly?”

“Things just aren’t working, Sir. It’s time for a change. The Rubins job was a balls up… sorry, a disappointment, and I don’t think that me or Bodie are working at our full potential whilst together.”

There was plenty that Cowley could say, plenty that he could ask and plenty that he could guess, but he decided to surprise Doyle instead.

“Very well, 4~5, as from tomorrow, you will be working with Molloy. I’ll let you inform both 3~7 and 5~3 in their change in circumstances seeing as you requested it. If there’s nothing else that you’d like to add, I suggest you go to look at the rota to find out what it is that you will be doing.”

Downbeat, Doyle left Cowley’s office to look at the work sheet. An agent sidled up beside him and Doyle instantly knew who it was.

“You’re working with me as from tomorrow.”

Agent Andy Molloy looked up at Doyle. Molloy looked as though the world was about to end. Doyle could only agree with him.

********************

In the end, word travelled so fast that Doyle didn’t need to break the news to his former partner. Jax was the first one to drop that particular bombshell.

“Hey, Bodie! What’s this about Ray partnering Andy Molloy now?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Doyle! He’s asked to be re-partnered. Hasn’t Cowley spoken to you?”

“No. No he hasn’t.”

Bodie was suddenly a mass of smouldering fury and several agents made hasty escapes from the restroom. Murphy came up behind Bodie and took over the coffee making task that seemed to be beyond Bodie’s capabilities.

“Hey mate, come on, you’re gonna be partnered with me for a while. Can’t be that bad can it?”

“No course not, Murph. Sorry, mate I’m just hacked off to stabbed in the back by Raymond fucking Doyle. So much for loyalty eh?”

“He’ll come round, Bodie, you’ll see. I recon he’s got a few issues at the moment. He copped a lot of flak over that raid on the Rubins place, didn’t he? P’raps you should try having a quiet word with him? Go out for a pint or something? He has been looking rough lately, maybe he just needs a mate, Bodie?”

“What’s this Molloy bloke like then, he any good?” said Bodie, changing the subject.

“Well I was with him for a while. He’s new but I didn’t have any problems with him. Did the job, watched my back, I had no complaints.”

“Well that’s something then I s’pose.”

Bodie made no attempt to contact Doyle, who was more lonely and depressed than ever. Disappointed that his change in partnership had forced him off the Rubins case he knew that he had no room to complain. He turned up for work every day though his heart wasn’t really in it. He felt awkward and uncomfortable at headquarters. He imagined there to be an aura of bad feeling towards him and he was starting to feel like an outcast. One morning he was walking down the corridor when he saw a raucous group gathered around his ex-partner. When Bodie got to the punchline, the group fell about and Doyle allowed himself a small smile. The ex-partners looked up and suddenly locked eyes. Bodie frowned before turning his back. The others looked around, saw Doyle and immediately became quiet, made their excuses and scuttled away.

********************

Andy Molloy proved to be a perfectly satisfactory partner. Whilst he couldn’t admit to enjoying the experience of working alongside Ray Doyle, he did learn a lot. Sadly not all of what he learned would be of much future use to him, 4~5 seemed to be like a walking automaton. Molloy wondered how on earth the legendary Bodie and Doyle teaming had ever managed to gain such status if this was the way that one half of the team worked.

In his more reflective moments, Doyle felt rather sorry for Molloy. He was a willing enough lad and Doyle had no room to complain about his work. He was dedicated and professional and it had just been his sheer bad luck to have ended up partnered with Doyle. Molloy’s only fault in Doyle’s eyes was that he wasn’t Bodie.

The headquarters of CI5 were in celebratory mood when Bodie’s team nabbed Harry Rubins. The team had done well. Bodie, Murphy, Anson and Jax had worked diligently on the job, gathering evidence through sheer hard graft and determination. The case was watertight. At least ten establishments could now breathe easy with the threat of enforced protection for money being removed. Cowley was jubilant and Doyle was quietly pleased. One of the men that had been sent down with their boss was likely responsible for killing Sadie, his friend, and he was eternally grateful to Bodie for that.

The news was good enough for Doyle to take pity on his hapless new partner and invite him out for a friendly drink. Molloy accepted the invitation willingly. In his eyes, Ray Doyle was starting to thaw, albeit ever so slightly. It was obvious that the man had more problems than he was likely to share, and respectfully, Molloy knew when to keep quiet and not ask too many questions.

The pub that Doyle selected was nearer to Molloy’s flat than his own. As it had been his invitation, he felt it only fair that he pick up a taxi tab and somehow he didn’t really want to take Molloy into any of his and Bodie’s old haunts. Doyle had frequented the establishment before, but not for many years and the place was looking decidedly worse for wear. The atmosphere did not seem conducive to a friendly, after work drink and Doyle was about to suggest a change of venue when Molloy brought over two foaming pints and carefully placed them on the stained, sticky table. The beer was far better Doyle had expected it would be and he decided for the moment at least, to stay put.

All of a sudden, he had no real idea what to talk to Molloy about. CI5 had brought him such little contentment lately that he was disinclined to talk shop. He needn’t have worried. Andy Molloy turned out to be an expert interrogator, and without wanting or meaning to, Doyle soon found himself talking about his own professional exploits with agent 3~7.

The first delicious pint didn’t touch the sides and Doyle could see how the place still managed to attract it’s customers. He somehow felt that he was attracting attention himself and not of the welcome variety. He didn’t recognise any faces but still felt bad vibes around him. Molloy however plonked down a second pint before him and he relaxed back into his shabby chair.

“Hey, that was my round!” he exclaimed.

“Ah, get the next one, Ray, not a bad drop is it?”

“No it’s very moreish actually!” Doyle chuckled.

Two beers later Doyle was feeling much more comfortable in his new partners company. They each learned a little of the other’s history. Though Molloy came from a military background, he was more articulate than a lot of the ex-army types Doyle had come across. He suddenly saw Andy Molloy through new eyes. So far their fledgling partnership hadn’t taxed either of them much. They had secured some babysitting jobs and a few boring obbos but nothing that had required Molloy to protect Doyle’s back nor vice versa. Doyle was about to discover Molloy’s protective qualities sooner than expected.

Finishing his fifth pint, Doyle’s bladder could cope no longer and he made for the gents as Molloy once again headed for the bar. The ale which had slipped down so easily hit Doyle slightly and he weaved to the toilets slightly unsteadily on his feet. As he zipped himself up, he smiled slightly to himself. Tonight had not been such a bad idea. Molloy had proved to be good company and Doyle was feeling pleasantly mellow.

Had he been slightly less mellow and slightly more sober, Doyle would have seen the punch to his midriff coming, but he wasn’t and he didn’t. He went down like a ton of bricks.

Molloy placed the drinks down on the table, wondering where Doyle had got himself to. He was just settling down when he heard the unmistakable sounds of trouble in the corridor beyond the door to the bar. Immediately, he rushed through the door, knowing that the corridor had been Doyle’s last destination. The sight before him chilled him to the marrow. There were only two of them but Doyle was on the floor between two thugs and one of them was kicking his head like it was a football. Though he could possibly have taken them both by brute force alone, Molloy chose the easy option, ripping a nearby fire extinguisher from the wall. Praying that the pub kept their safety appliances well serviced, he grabbed the hose and rushed at the two men. He depressed the trigger and aimed the cone in a sweeping arc over both men’s eyes. The freezing carbon dioxide temporarily blinded them enough to cause them to fall back, scratching at their faces. Molloy hurled the extinguisher towards one, clipping his shoulder and taking him down. He rugby tackled the other and within seconds had them cuffed to each other.

Molloy was only vaguely aware of the screams and shouts that the incident had started to attract as he called it in. When the staff and patrons saw the handcuffs and Molly’s R/T however, they cautiously backed off.

“This is agent 5~3. Priority A3! Agent down, assistance required, ambulance and transport for two attackers, The Hogs Back Pub, Wimbledon.”

Molly’s report was rapid but precise and was heard by three mobile units apart from central control. Though Bodie and Murphy were just clocking off for the night and were probably the furthest away from the incident, as soon as Molloy reported 4~5’s head injuries, Bodie slung the car around and put his foot down.

By the time 3~7 and 6~2 arrived at the scene, blue flashing lights seemed to light up the night sky. Bodie quickly picked out Cowley who seemed to be comforting a shaken looking Andy Molloy. Bodie curbed his initial instinct to launch into Molloy when two ambulance men brought out an unconscious Doyle. They were just loading the stretcher into their vehicle when their patient started to twist and shake uncontrollably. The medics immediately responded, injecting Doyle with something which seemed to still him.

Bodie made to bolt towards the ambulance but Cowley held him back.

“Let them do their job, Laddie.”

But as the ambulance men started to close the doors, Bodie manoeuvred out of Cowley’s grip.

“Sorry, Sir but I’ve got to be with my partner.”

********************

Bodie stared down at Doyle’s swollen face. One side was almost completely covered in an ugly, claret coloured bruise. Bodie had also glimpsed a bloodshot eye and blown pupil, during Doyle’s brief flashes into consciousness, but otherwise 4~5 had been very, very lucky. The doctors had immediately performed x-rays and blood tests and treated Doyle for shock. The results showed no further evidence of internal bleeding and no skull fracture. Doyle had suffered no more fits and the medical staff were satisfied that his condition was ‘comfortable’.

Bodie sat by Doyle’s bedside throughout the night. At dawn, he was ushered out by the medical team who wished to carry out their morning observations and he went in search of coffee.

Doyle roused, cracking his eyes against the daylight. He could hear sounds at the bottom of the bed and he smiled inwardly. Bodie. Steps came towards him but the vision that came into his view was not that of Bodie, but a pretty nurse about half the size and weight of his ex-partner. Doyle desperately tried to turn his head though it felt like an express train was thundering through his brain. The Bodie shaped hole that Doyle so needed to be filled, was all too apparent to him. The empty space beside the bed was like a vacuum which sucked out the last of his hope. With cold, stinging tears sliding down his cheeks, he gave into the pounding pain and slipped back into sleep.

Three hours later, Doyle’s eyes forced him into wakefulness again. He felt like a limpet being prised from a rock face. This time when he gingerly turned his head, Bodie was sitting beside him. Whether or not he believed the vision portrayed in front of him, it brought him no joy. Even the fact that Bodie appeared to be clutching his hand seemed only to reinforce his feeling of unreality.

Bodie smiled down at him.

“Hello, sleepyhead.”

“What are you doing here?” Doyle whispered.

“Where else would you expect me to be?”

“You weren’t here before.”

“Oh yes I was. They told me you woke up, but by the time I got back, you’d nodded off again.”

“So why are you here now?”

“Because you got a kicking, Ray. It’s what we do. It’s what we’ve always done. Of course I’m here for you.”

“Last week you didn’t even want to talk to me. Now you’ve done your duty, you might as well piss off again.”

“Raymond Doyle, I’m not going anywhere. I know I’ve behaved like a dick. But…but this isn’t going to go away is it?”

“What isn’t?

“This thing between…”

“SHIT!”

Doyle lurched forwards although it obviously hurt him to do so. Bodie was instantly there for him with a cardboard bowl. Doyle heaved and heaved spewing up a thick brown liquid which he spat and spluttered out with disgust.

“You want a nurse, Sunshine?”

“No… no it’s better now. I feel better now. Christ, you’re covered in shit!”

“That’s okay, don’t you worry about that, you’ve had a head injury, we both know what that’s like.”

“Sorry, Bodie.”

“Don’t be bloody daft.”

The last thing Doyle felt as Bodie gently lowered him down in the comfort of the starched pillows was a feather light kiss to his forehead.

When Doyle surfaced, Bodie was still sat beside him, but looked freshly showered and changed. He was, Doyle thought, a sight for sore eyes and his heart gave a little jolt.

“You’re still here then?”

“I told you I wasn’t going anywhere. Not unless you wanted me to that is?”

“It’s not up to me what you do, Bodie.”

“Well it ought to be. Seems like you’ve been the better one at making decisions lately.”

“What does that mean?”

“You and me. Us. Together. As lovers.”

“Look, I’m sorry alright? If I’d ever thought it would have come to this I would never have said anything. The last thing I wanted to do was lose your friendship. I didn’t consider your feelings for a moment. I just acted like a prick and…”

“You were right.”

“What?”

“You were right all along. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven when you said you wanted me.”

“Eh? Then why…”

“I was scared, Ray.”

“Scared? Scared of what exactly?”

“I don’t do relationships.”

“For heaven’s sake, I didn’t exactly propose marriage, Bodie!”

“Didn’t you? Because… the thing is, it couldn’t be anything less with you. I wouldn’t settle for anything less. It’s all or nothing, I’m afraid.”

“Well ‘nothing’ hasn’t done me much good, so what’s so scary about ‘all’?"

“Like I said, I don’t ‘do’ relationships.”

“Why? Commitment cramp your style a bit too much does it? Worried that if you settled down the rest of humankind would be missing out?"

“NO! That’s not it, that’s not it at all! It’s… it’s just I’ve had a few romances before that could have ended up being serious and they didn’t end very well at all.”

“Well p’raps you just hadn’t found the right person?”

“They didn’t end well because the people in question died, Ray.”

“Oh God. Sorry, Bodie. Was it your fault they died though? Was being in a relationship with you what killed them?”

“Not directly no. But getting involved with me is like opening up Pandora’s Box, Ray. It’s as if the people I fall for must have some sort of death wish. That’s why I keep it casual. Couple of dates, have some fun and then finish it. Christ, even some of the casual ones have taken their lives in their hands dating me!”

“You sure you’re not just being a bit paranoid?"

“Well let’s see shall we? Remember Julia who I took for a nice days boating on the river? Bet an armed siege wasn’t exactly her idea of a grand day out? And Claire, who I took out for a nice romantic meal? Dare say getting bombed wasn’t right up there on her wish list!”

“So you were in the wrong place at the wrong time. That wasn’t your fault! What is it, Bodie? Do you feel guilty about those people that died? Or are you worried about being left alone? Because if you don’t ever have a relationship, then you’re gonna be left alone anyway!”

“I’m just worried for you, Ray. That’s why when you suggested that we got it together, I couldn’t contemplate it, not even for a second, no matter how much I might have wanted to.”

“So what’s changed? If you’re so worried about my welfare, why are you telling me all this?”

“Because I’ve spent the last month without you by my side and I fucking hated it, Ray. I don’t blame you if you’re not interested any more, but I wasn’t honest with you and now I want to be. I don’t want to put you at risk and I know nothing may come of this, but if either of us died tomorrow, it breaks my heart to think that I’d never told you how much I loved you.”

“You… you bloody LOVE me?”

“Yes, Ray. I love you, I’ve loved you for years. I love you so damn much that I had just HAD to put you off when you suggested we start something, even though it nearly killed me to do so. And that’s the first time I’ve ever said that to anyone before, so feel bloody honoured!”

“Christ! Bodie, that makes me feel... it makes me feel amazin’!”

“You shouldn’t, I’ve behaved like an arsehole.”

“I must admit, I did feel a bit… I dunno, abandoned, I s’pose. Just felt like it was all my fault, and I got what I deserved.”

“I could have handled it all better. Even if I hadn’t been interested, I could have been a bit gentler about it. It just seemed that attack was the best form of defence at the time. Not just towards you, Ray, towards others as well.”

“Oh yeah, who else got the sharp end of your tongue then?”

“Well, Sadie for one.”

“Ah, yes, Sadie. You never did like Sadie, did you?”

“No, but not for the reasons that you’re thinking. Don’t forget, I’ve travelled the world enough, Ray. I’ve seen sights that would make Sadie look normal in a village pub. The only gripe I had with ‘Sadie’ was caused by my own jealousy.”

“What? You were jealous of a middle aged drag queen?”

“No, but I was jealous of the reactions he got from you. There was never any harm in him, and I’m bloody ashamed of the way I acted. But seeing you kiss and hug him so easily just made me want to smash his lights out.”

“I gave him what he expected so that he would give me what I needed, Bodie. It was a game I was happy enough to play. There was never more to it than that, I knew it and he knew it.”

“But… I wanted to kiss you. I really want to kiss you now.”

“Well you sure pick your moments don’t you?"

“How do you mean?”

“Well, I’m in a hospital bed, stinking of vomit. IF, we are to have a relationship, and IF it’s going to last as long as you want it to, then I don’t really want to forever remember our first kiss being here and now.”

“Okay then. Let’s make a plan. Let’s do it properly if we’re going to do it at all.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“Well… as soon as you’re fending for yourself, I’ll come and pick you up and take you out to dinner. Somewhere nice. I’ll even pay! Then… if you fancy it, p’raps you might like to come back to mine for a nightcap. Then I suppose we could just take things from there?”

“You’re asking me out on a date, Bodie?”

“Oh heck, yeah I suppose I am!”

“In that case, I accept. You do realise I get out of here tomorrow morning?”

“Oh Christ, do you?”

“What, changing your mind already?”

“No! Well no not really. I’m still scared to death, Ray.”

“Look, Bodie. Cowley has told us endless times that CI5 partnerships are closer than most marriages. Therefore, we’ve been ‘married’ to each other for more than seven years. I haven’t died yet have I?”

“No I guess not.”

“And when I woke up and you weren’t here… I… wanted to die anyway. It was horrible without you, mate. I didn’t care about anything. I went to work but I didn’t care about CI5. I had a good new partner but I didn’t give a shit about him. I didn’t do anything remotely useful since I asked to be reteamed and I only did that because I was performing like a dick. And anyway, if you’re supposed to be my kiss of death, how come I’m in here when we weren’t even partnered together?”

“Seems you pissed someone off when you were in the Met, Sunshine. Bloke that tried to kick your brains out was one Terry Aldridge. You managed to get his old man put away ten years ago for burglary. He would have died anyway, the fat, old has been, but young Terence seemed to blame you for the fact that pater didn’t live out his twilight years without a nice view of metal bars. And from what I hear, we owe Andy Molloy a beer or two as well.”

********************

For the first time in three days, Bodie returned to his flat with the intention of staying there. He had called upon Cowley, demanded a long overdue week’s leave, surprised himself by actually getting it and now was trying to calm his frayed nerves. Somehow, the whole course of his life seemed to have changed in the last twenty four hours. Half of him was filled with a bubbling fizz of anticipation, whilst the other was masked by a black cloud of fear and dread.

He buzzed around the place, obsessively cleaning and tidying. Doyle had been to all of his flats hundreds of times and would surely never notice the difference, but somehow, order and neatness seemed important to him. The manically performed tasks also seemed to keep his mind from straying into the unchartered waters it seemed desperate to steer towards. He couldn’t believe he was behaving so irrationally. Doyle had been by his side for years so why all of a sudden did he feel so bloody nervous? Because Ray Doyle was the be all and end all that was why. He instinctively knew that Doyle was the last person that he would ever love. The last he would ever kiss. The last he would ever cherish. All roads had eventually lead him to Ray’s door. He had held off the coupling for as long as Doyle’s patience could bear but in the end he had to bend to inevitability.

He gave special attention to the master bedroom, vacuuming under the bed, changing the bedding for crisp, fresh linen and firmly switching off his alarm clocks. The next time he slept here, he hoped to be accompanied. Tonight, he would accommodate the box room. Finally he had sufficiently tired himself into some sort of relaxation and he went to his fridge. He ignored the carefully selected bottles of wine chilling there and got himself a beer. A few cans later he felt pleasantly chilled himself. Surely the irrational fear of commitment that had built up in him for the last fifteen years could be laid to rest? Wasn’t he as entitled to a bit of happiness the same as everyone else? Doyle was probably right. He was just being paranoid. There was nothing to fear. Probably.

The following morning, doctors eventually pronounced Doyle fit to leave their care. His head still stung a bit but he seemed to know that there was nothing seriously wrong with it any more. The bruising had softened and his eye had cleared. At ten on the dot Molloy collected him and dropped him at his flat. The dutiful young agent would possibly have remained there for the rest of his natural life had Doyle demanded it of him, but after arguments and assurances, Doyle was finally left alone. Thanking the heavens for hot water timers, he drew himself a bath and luxuriated in the joys of soaking himself clean.

He had, as usual, refused the hospital breakfast and now as a consequence, felt hungry. He went to inspect his fridge with impending doom. He smiled when he peered inside its brightly lit interior, Bodie had been here. Fresh produce occupied the shelves and he selected eggs and orange juice before reaching for his bread bin which revealed the new wholemeal loaf that he knew would be there. After eating heartily, he called Bodie at his flat.

“Well I’ve been sprung mate. Thanks for the supplies. Hope you didn’t have plans for tonight, I’m expecting to be picked up at seven?”

Bodie smiled down into the receiver.

“You okay? Anything you need? Anything you want me to do for you?”

“Just be here. Tonight. At seven. Oh, and Bodie? Look gorgeous. That doesn’t normally give you too much trouble.”

Doyle happily took himself off to the sheer luxury of his own bed to indulge in six hours of uninterrupted, beautiful sleep.

Bodie worried and fretted and tidied again.

The date was perfect. The food was sublime although neither Bodie nor Doyle could recall what they had eaten or what it had tasted like. Having been apart for so long, they didn’t need to refer to work in order to make conversation. Thrilled to be in each other’s company again, after a few shy, stilting starts, they talked nine to the dozen, laughed out loud and smiled all night. At the end of the evening, Bodie dutifully paid what Doyle guessed must be an astronomical bill and they hailed a taxi.

Bodie turned to Doyle, a timid look on his face.

“So, you coming back to mine? Still time to back out if you want to, no hard feelings?”

Doyle gave Bodie a look of patient resignation before dragging him into the cab and telling the driver their destination.

There were steps up to Bodies block of flats. Eight of them. He counted each one of them as he climbed, for the first time since he’d lived there. In his head, he recited a version of the old daisy chain rhyme, but rather than ‘He loves me, he loves me not’, Bodie heard ‘I love him: he’s going to die.’ As he reached the eighth step, Bodie felt a cold shiver run down his spine.

********************

Inside the beautifully warm flat, the partners just stared at each other as if wondering what to do next. Then suddenly it was there. The kiss that Doyle had yearned for and Bodie had dreamed of for years. In the space of three minutes, Doyle’s hopes became reality and Bodies demons were temporarily banished. Gasping for air, Bodie looked down at his partner, flushed and panting. Carefully mindful of Doyle’s recent injury, he gently swept his partner off his feet and carried him to the bedroom. If Doyle had been in any way offended by this display of dominance, he didn’t care to voice it and curled back onto the perfect bed displaying a ‘cat that got the cream’ expression. Within ten minutes, they had made love with the desperate urgency of all new bed mates. The loving was as perfectly coordinated as anything they had performed as professional partners. Bodies beautiful bed however, was a wreck. Nature being an honest antidote to modesty, Doyle announced his need to piss, giving Bodie the opportunity to fetch the wine and two glasses. They drank a good half bottle each whilst replenishing their own physical resources.

Doyle was in heaven. He had never felt quite like this. It was like hearing a terrific record he had never heard before or seeing a film that nobody else had seen. For all his feelings about drug use, he had smoked enough joints in his time. None had ever made him feel as complete as this though, so totally real, so wonderfully alive. Bodie, the man that had stood by his side for so long had suddenly become the lover that he had sought for years.

Bodie stared down at his dishevelled partner. Nobody would have guessed that Doyle had been a hospital in-patient twenty four hours previously. Bodie was torn. He was in his own safe flat and the most beautiful man he had ever laid eyes on had just brought them both to orgasm. He should be in paradise and the better part of him was. There was still a small part of him however that churned and mocked. A part that made him want to banish that lovely face from his mind forever. He stared down into the face and wondered how this could ever be so wrong…

The next time that Bodie and Doyle made love was less hurried and pressured than the first. Relieved of first time nerves and relaxed by chilled Chardonnay, they fitted together like parts of a jigsaw. No part of their bodies was untouched, un kissed, un probed or unloved. Finally, at the point of exhaustion they both admitted the need for sleep. Before he let the wilds of dreamland take him however, Doyle spoke the words that Bodie both craved and feared.

“Love you, Bodie.”

Bodie cradled his partner as he had in his thoughts on so many lonely nights. The following morning Doyle woke with Bodie completely wrapped around him. It was stiflingly hot, the wreckage of the bed was ever so slightly damp and he had the vestiges of a headache. He felt so wonderful however that he wouldn’t have swapped places with the Queen of England.

Bodie woke, his face snuggled into a cascade of auburn curls. He was plastered around Doyle as if the man was suddenly about to try and run away from him. So they had done it then. They had opened the box. It had been wonderful and special and as fantastic as Bodie ever could have wished, but he quietly wondered if Doyle should have run while he still had the chance.

For the next hour, they proved that the previous night’s activities had not been a one off. They then rose for a steaming shower, a heartily cooked Bodie special and a leisurely morning. Bodie was unwilling to break the easy mood, but the subject of work had to be discussed sooner or later.

“So, do want me back as your partner?”

“Are you willing to have me?”

“I didn’t want to get rid of you in the first place!”

“I know. It just seemed like the best thing to do at the time. I was letting personal stuff get in the way of the job and that could have got bloody dangerous, Bodie.”

“So how do we know that that won’t happen again, for either of us? I mean it’s even more likely now isn’t it?”

“Yeah that thought has crossed my mind. And if Cowley were to find out about us, he’d probably split us anyway. That’s if we still ended up keeping our jobs at all.”

“I don’t want to work without you, Ray. Murph’s good, he’s bloody good but he’s not you. I wanna be able to watch your back like I always have.”

“Works both ways, mate.”

“Ray, can I ask you something? Something important?”

“Course, what is it?”

“How do you feel exactly, about us? Like this I mean? I know it’s only been a day or so, but how do you really feel about it?”

Doyle gave Bodie a suspicious sidelong glance.

“I feel great about it. Why, don’t you?” he asked quietly.

“Do you think it can last? Do you want it to last? I’m talking forever, Ray, not just a year or two until we get a bit bored. Do you think we can really make a go of it?”

“I’m willing to try if you are. In fact, I want it more than anything but if you’re about to break my heart because you think you’ve made a mistake, Bodie then you better tell me right now and put me out of my misery, sharpish!”

Bodie heard the catch in Doyle’s voice and enveloped him in hug.

“Ssh, sweetheart, it’s okay. I haven’t changed my mind. But there is something I’d like to ask you to think about.”

“What… what’s that?”

“That we consider leaving the squad.”

“But… but you love the job!”

“Not as much as I love you. Priorities change, Ray. CI5 has dictated the course of my life for the last God knows how many years and I haven’t minded that, not really. But now I’ve got you. It was hard enough watching your back before, but if anything happened to you now, well…”

“I could get run over by a bus tomorrow, Sunshine.”

“Yeah I know that, but you know as well as I do the life expectancy for anyone in this setup. I just wanna know that now we’ve started up together, we’ve got some sort of future to look forward to. Tell me if I’m being a prat, Ray, I know it’s not fair springing this on you out of the blue.”

“Sorry, Bodie, I was just playing Devil’s advocate, that’s all. Truth is, I’m thrilled that you brought it up. I’ve been wondering for a long time how far our luck would go. Getting out wasn’t an option all the time that you stayed in, guarding your back was my responsibility. That’s been brought home to me even more in the last few weeks since I walked away from that responsibility. The number of times I’ve almost quit since then, well you wouldn’t want to know about them!”

“Really? Christ I’ve been so worried, Ray! I didn’t feel I even had the right to ask!”

“Course you had the right to ask. If anyone’s been a prat it’s me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well… well you’re not going to like this…”

“Go on…”

“Well there was another reason that I wouldn’t quit all the time that you stayed in. There are enough good people that can watch your back. I’m not that bloody special and I know it. The thing was, if I walked, then I would be walking away from you as well. I mean, I know we might stay mates and maybe meet up once in a while, but it wouldn’t have been the same, Bodie. It would be like cutting off my right arm. I couldn’t tell really you this before though, could I? And it’s certainly not a good enough reason to stay in a job like ours. Cowley would slay me alive if he had any idea!”

Bodie’s lungs let out the gust of air they’d been holding as if a mammoth weight had suddenly been lifted from his shoulders.

“It seems to me as though we’ve been thinking along the same lines, Angelfish. I had no idea how to suggest we quit yet still somehow stay together. It’s not the thing that most workmates really do is it?”

“No I guess not.” Doyle chuckled. “What do you fancy doing next then?”

“Doesn’t really matter does it? I dunno, run a pub? Work on a building site? Join the dole queue? Doesn’t matter to me at all, Ray. I’ll apply for the next dustman’s job going as long as I know that you’ll be there for me to come home to at the end of the shift.”

“I s’pose we ought to have a word we he who must be obeyed first, eh? Not really looking forward to that conversation much.”

“You’re sure you didn’t mind me asking you?”

“As long as you’re sure about me. I’m gobsmacked that you want to quit too, but I’ve got no argument with it.”

“In that case, when do we tell him?”

“Well I’m still off sick and you’re on leave but I vote we get it over with as soon as possible.”

“And I vote that when we’ve worked out our notice, we take some time off. Get away from things a bit. Maybe somewhere warm?”

“I can do warm. Sounds idyllic. We’ve still got to tell him though.”

A small smile starting on his face, Bodie winked at his partner before lifting the phone.

********************

Two days later, Bodie and Doyle sat outside George Cowley’s office awaiting their requested interview. When prompted by Betty, they entered the hallowed ground like to men about to face the firing squad.

Cowley looked up at them. They couldn’t gauge his mood though that was nothing new.

“Ah, 4~5, 3~7. You requested to speak with me?”

Doyle jumped in.

“We did, Sir. We wish to be re partnered. Together that is.”

Cowley gave them both the look that he knew would be the undoing of them.

“Oh. That is what you wish, Doyle is it? And since when did what you wish become more important than the decisions that I myself or the personnel department make?”

Bodie chose to make his stand.

“And we also wish to hand you our resignations, Sir.”

Cowley stared at the two of them for so long that it became uncomfortable. Eventually he took pity on them. They had made their decision. Whatever had been said between the two of them he couldn’t counter argue and was not about to try. They had been his best men. If they were able to glean some happiness from the dusty mess that their lives must have become, he was not about to stand in their way. He sincerely hoped that they could find what they were looking for, unlike himself.

By the end of the day, the partners had a finishing date for their CI5 careers and two air tickets to the Algarve. They still had a month in Mr. Cowley’s employ but he had assured to assign them the lightest of duties to see out their remaining days. News of their going quickly spread and the party to end all parties was hastily arranged. Nobody once questioned their decision to leave together, in fact far more gossip would have been generated had only one of them chosen to go. For once, Bodie entered the records department and studied cold cases with the minimum of complaint. Doyle appeared to be in his element bidding farewell to the multitude of female staff who were mourning his imminent departure.

At the end of each day, they enjoyed the simple pleasures the majority of the population took for granted, leaving at a reasonable hour, unstressed, unexhausted and unharmed. They spent their nights worshipping each other and their days appreciating the sheer joy of togetherness.

Bodie was starting to relax. It seemed that opening ‘Pandora’s Box’ had not been so unthinkable on this occasion after all. Ray had been right. Bodie had just needed the right person to come along. For the first time that he could recall he felt truly happy. He was deeply in love, with a man who seemed only too happy to give him everything that he ever dreamed of. The shadows of doubt seemed to ebb away. Memories of disasters past started to fade. His own worries seemed to slide away as new, tentative feelings of confidence replaced them.

Doyle and Bodie’s leaving party would go down in CI5 history. Even people that the partners ashamedly thought long dead attended. Two engagements of marriage where made and if later gossip was to be believed, at least one new life conceived. Doyle stared around him at one point. These were his colleagues. He would never call them friends, it hurt too much when friends died. He suddenly realised that he was doing exactly the right thing. He was among special people who had helped him stay alive. He hoped that in his own small way he had helped them too. But he had chosen to forsake their support for the one that really mattered. Thinking of Bodie who he’d hardly seen all night, he went in search of his partner. He found and dragged him away from a deep and meaningful conversation with Lewis. Finding themselves in a deserted corridor, Bodie and Doyle’s flushed, desperate kiss was only observed by Murphy who smiled to himself as he realigned his coordinates for the loo.

The final few days of their service was an anti-climax for Bodie and Doyle. Reluctant to give up the fun of the Capri’s, they were more than happy to indulge in donkey work even if they did drive a little faster than the tasks commanded. Sitting in an illegally parked vehicle in Kensington, the last thing they expected was a priority A3 call.

“Shit that’s Malloy!”

“We don’t have to answer it, Ray.”

“Come on, Bodie we’re just round the corner, of course we do!”

Knowing the truth of Doyle’s words, Bodie slung the car into gear and trust it into the breach.

********************

They were just kids. Paid by people who would never worry about their upbringing or ideals. Kids who'd never realised that doing what some knowledgeable man told them to would make such a difference. Kids who had no real idea how to fire a gun nor the consequences behind doing so.

Doyle being Doyle thought he could save everybody. An agent was down. A clipped wing was just that, but the wing contained an artery which was bleeding out. Doyle could no more stop himself going to aid than Bodie could stop him going.

The kids had no idea. They hadn’t been told it would be like this. They hadn’t been warned of resistance. Just put the box inside the foyer was all they had heard. They were given the guns to make them feel important. To make them look like men. They had no idea that planting a bomb (if they knew what it was that they were planting) in some unheard of embassy would have been pre-empted and monitored and witnessed. That they would have been faced by men who knew exactly what they were doing. Men who forced them to fire back in sheer terror. Seeing the spurt of blood that only they could have caused was the unravelling of them. They were beyond comfort and beyond reason. They were uncontrolled and dangerously trigger happy.

Bodie had seen Doyle’s call to action so often that it was like watching a much loved ballet. He knew in his heart however that the fire his partner drew could not be shielded by all of her majesties forces. Bodie didn’t even have time to lift his gun. The images happened before his eyes in slow motion. He followed the trajectory of the stray bullet that tore its way through Doyle’s head as if watching a dying firework.

Bodie walked through the ensuing gunfire between agents and miscreants as if protected by a force field. He stood down and looked at the remains of his professional partner and only true love. He would never again be able to picture the cherub like face. The slightly uneven cheeks, the chipped tooth, the quick tilt of the head when Ray considered something. Those memories were smashed forever. All he would remember now were the fragments that Pandora’s Box had left him with. Splashes of blood and skin and grey matter scattered on a dirty pavement. The terror of his aloneness screamed through him. He stemmed his tears. He didn’t deserve to shed them. He had warned Doyle, but not nearly enough. His own selfish wants had brought about the end of a clever and beautiful man.

Whatever had caused Bodie to be the unfortunate recipient of the death shadow that followed him around was unimportant now. He had broken his own rules. So much pain. So much blood. He had never conscientiously stopped either.

The screaming of sirens made him cock his head. They were loud. Cowley would not be far behind them. He could never face the looks of pity. He didn’t feel like he deserved them. The growing noise of the blues and twos masked the sound of the gunshot he swallowed.

In his dreams, Bodie would have lived out his Heavenly years with his beloved partner. In his nightmares, he would forever see that dirty pavement in South Kensington.

*******************

Somewhere in Chelsea, operatives cleared out the personal effects of a CI5 flat. The flashy VHS video recorder was deemed new enough to be kept. After a few winks and nudges, the mucky tape inside it was tossed away with rest of the rubbish.

*****

End.

 

 

 

 

Warning: Major Character Death

 

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